Surviving the Bosnian Genocide: The Women of Srebrenica Speak

by Selma Leydesdorff, Kay Richardson (Translator)

In July 1995, the Army of the Serbian Republic killed some 8,000 Bosnian men and boys in and around the town of Srebrenica—the largest mass murder in Europe since World War II. Surviving the Bosnian Genocide is based on the testimonies of 60 female survivors of the massacre who were interviewed by Dutch historian Selma Leydesdorff. The women, many of whom still live in refugee camps, talk about their lives before the Bosnian war, the events of the massacre, and the ways they have tried to cope with their fate. Drawing on their memories, though fragmented by trauma, the women tell of life and survival under extreme conditions, while recalling a time before the war when Muslims, Croats, and Serbs lived together peaceably. By giving them a voice, this book looks beyond the rapes, murders, and atrocities of that dark time to show the agency of these women during and after the war and their fight to uncover the truth of what happened at Srebrenica and why.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, War, Womens Studies

272 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2008

About the author

Prof. dr. Selma Leydesdorff is professor of oral history and culture. Her career is part of the transformation of oral history from mostly a fact-finding method-adding to and criticizing traditional historical narratives-to research on the ways memory is framed and modified over time. It has always been influenced by women's history. She moved from gender studies to her present position. She promoted oral history by extensive teaching and with the help of the National research School of Cultural History she formalized the national network in oral history.

In 1987, her dissertation on the Jewish poor of Amsterdam, 1900-1940 (Amsterdam 1987, Wayne State UP 1994; Suhrkamp, 1994) introduced a critical revision of the then-dominant historiography of the modernization and assimilation of poor Jews. Fascinated by trauma stories and the life story approach, and helping to set up the expanding international oral history network, she published Water and Memory on the memories of the Netherlands floods of 1953.

Publishing books and editing volumes that have shaped oral history is the main thread running through her academic career. As editor since 2001 she is co-responsible for the publication of many volumes and more are in preparation. Themes are totalitarianism, subjectivity, trauma, the transmission of stories. She was fellow at the Remarque Center in New York, and During the academic year 2010-2011 she was asked to collaborate the CNRS/NYU memory project, rethinking 'the representation of war' in collaboration with the September 11 Museum (New York) and with a grant of the Memorial de Caen (France).

Yearly she teaches a PhD-course on oral history at the Dutch National Research School of Cultural History (Huizinga) that is being attended by doctoral students and post-docs from many countries.

The last ten years she interviewed on life in concentration camps and recorded interviews with survivors of Auschwitz and Mauthausen in international projects.

In 2002, she started a project with survivors of Srebrenica, which brought a major international attention as an oral historian of trauma. The book detailing the Srebrenica story was published first in Dutch, then in Bosnian, and an English translation. The American edition got major public attention and the book appeared in paperback in 2015. She lectured widely in the US and participated in several publication projects. Her article on Bosnia in the volume Oral History on the Edge (Oxford University Press 2014, ed S. Sloane, M. Cave) is part of a collection that got the price of the American Oral History Society 2015

Since 2008, she has recorded life stories around the trial of John Demjanjuk in Munich, including survivors of Sobibor and co-plaintiffs in the trial. The results have been published as www.lategevolgenvansobibor.nl.

As a result of her work she is public speaker on themes as 'the holocaust', 'Jewish history' and 'trauma and memory'. She will give the opening keynote in April 2016 at the European Society for Trauma and Dissociation.

In 2017 she will publish a biography of Aleksandr (Sasha) Pechersky, the leader of the uprising of Sobibor who became after his return to his hometown Rostov on Don the victim of the Stalinist antisemitic purges. She has been using material from archives all over the world and she traveled to people who knew about his history. At the moment the research is in collaboration with Foundation Sobibor, and the work is sponsored by the Rabbi Israel Miller Fund of the Jewish Claims Conference. There have been many more sponsors.

She is member of the advisory board of Stumbling Rocks, Zeeland (Struikelstenen, Zeeland)

In 2015 she started to co-work on refugee stories together with ‘unknown singular’ a project that involves refugees in doing life stories. She was member of the expert team and co-organized a major international conference on the theme. The project will be continued as an effort to connect various local ar

Reviews

[Roz · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was an eye-opening read as part of my Ethnic Cleansing class. I had never learned or really understood what happened in the 1990s in Bosnia, but this was an important history, especially in terms of women's history. What happened to these women was abominable and I wish it was enough to motivate world powers to prevent happenings like these where genocide and ethnic cleansing were intervened sooner rather than later.

[Tim · Rating 4 out of 5]

Oral histories have the power to relate a huge array about the human experience and Leydesdorff's collection of testimony from the genocide in Srebrenica conveys the full weight of tragedy and isolation felt by the women who survived.

I will have a full review of this book in a forthcoming issue of the Oral History Review from Oxford University Press.

[Hannah · Rating 5 out of 5]

It was a beautiful collection of memories. I was glad I had context to the genocide, since this doesn't always follow a coherent order you would need for a first encounter with the history. It is important to hear and give women the opportunity to speak, especially when they have been abused, ignored, and silenced for so long.

[Amra Pajalic · Rating 5 out of 5]

"In July 1995 the Army of the Serbian Republic killed some 8,000 men and boys in and around the town of Srebrenica--the largest mass murder in Europe since WWII." Selma Leydesdorff is a oral historian who interviewed the female survivors of the massacre and through this book gives them a voice. They are the witnesses to genocide who have been silenced, and initially were called crazy women. Leydesdorff does an amazing job of telling the women's stories, while also sharing the context of how trauma affects survivors. This is a book that is focussed on giving these women a voice that they have been denied and through their voice brings to life the suffering that they, and the men and boys were killed, suffered.

[Kate Anthony · Rating 5 out of 5]

a different perspective.

[Nelleke · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good to read, for better understanding.

Verschrikkelijk was er in Srebenica is gebeurd en nog triester is dat de overlevenden weinig hulp krijgen. Ze zijn ook nu nog vooral bezig met overleven en hebben hun verlies nog geen plaats kunnen geven. Dit boek gaf mij inzicht in de gruwelijkheden die in Bosnie hebben afgespeeld . Gruwelijk maar boeiend